Smartphones, tablets, and TVs — oh my! It seems every day a new device hits the market, providing consumers with even more options to stay connected. As a result, consumers are increasingly sophisticated in the ways in which they engage with media. Advances in technology have uncovered new ways to communicate, inform, and transact — how can marketers maintain a strong consumer connection as consumption habits and purchase decisions shift amidst an ever-changing marketplace? Are you sending the right signals to reach your customers?

Over the last several weeks, the Alphachimp Team has had the pleasure of supporting these gathering of media partners and major marketers at Google New York office.

From Pop!Tech:

October 25, 2008: Laurie Garrett shares her proposal for a change in global health policy, and accompanying shifts in foreign policy and perception by countries like the US. photography by kris krüg Renowned global health expert Laurie Garrett gave a powerful and frightening talk at PopTech 2008 on how countries deal - both effectively and ineffectively - with pandemics. Examining China's response to SARS, she asked: what if this happened here? How would we respond? Her presentation is essential viewing right now:

Yesterday, just in time for the World Health Organization to raise the threat level from a 3 to a 4 (on a 6-point scale), Laurie gave a wide-ranging press teleconference on Swine Flu. We've summarized some of her high-level questions and answers on our blog:http://www.poptech.org/blog/index.php/archives/3356

Finally, 2008 PopTech Fellow Erik Hersman (http://twitter.com/whiteafrican) wrote a terrific piece on information patterns that emerge during an emergency on social networking platforms (like Twitter), and how these can be aggregated and turned into real-time maps that shape a strategy for intervention:

The above represent just the kind of clear thinking we may yet need in this circumstance. Have a look, and if you feel moved to do so, please help us share these insights by forwarding, blogging, and tweeting the above to friends and colleagues.

From Joe & Rita Sterling of Sterling Insights:

It’s been three years since our last pandemic readiness workbook update: Preparing for Pandemic – Family and Neighborhood Readiness Workbook. The Avian Flu has continued to smolder in Asia, Africa and parts of the Middle East only a few new human cases emerged. However, other strains of influenza have continued to mutate, including the new Swine Flu which is in the news today.

“As
you simplify your life, the laws of the universe will be simpler;
solitude will not be solitude, poverty will not be poverty, nor
weakness weakness.” - Henry David Thoreau

ZenHabits.net is a very personal blog by Leo Babauta. Somehow, married with six kids, this writer, runner and vegetarian models of honesty and serenity, as well as provides a trove of simplicity hacks.